Fantasy Baseball Today - 04/01: Weekend Roundup (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: April 1, 2019

So many SPs to add! We start the show talking about all of the MIA, MIL and SD guys plus Matt Boyd, Lucas Giolito, Jake Odorizzi, Yonny Chirinos and more! After an introductory discussion, the guys give a quick thought on each relevant SP (7:25). And let's get a look at the Most Added list (19:30) ... Bullpen notes as we may have some RPs to add for saves (27:40). Plus weekend standouts (35:55) like Yandy Diaz, Yu Darvish and Collin McHugh and top hitters from the weekend (41:30) ... SPs galore (44:00)! The final 15 minutes of our show is dedicated to SPs to add, drop, be pumped about and be concerned about ... Email us at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Where fantasy! Now here's Adam, Scott, Heath, and Chris. All right, our first weekend roundup here of the 2019 season. A lot to talk about.

Welcome to Fantasy Baseball today, everybody. It is Monday morning. I'm Adam Azer with Scott White. Keith Cummings, guys, isn't me or was almost every pitcher really, really good over the weekend? Are there like 15 that you want to pick up right now? Or they were really, really bad. Or that, yeah. Yeah. Basically, the ones people probably started were bad and the ones people were kind of interested in, but weren't willing to start yet.

They were good. There's a lot to digest. So we will look at the most added list and see who you are adding. We will talk about the pitchers that are worrying us. I would say that, hey, I'm off to a great start with the player I love. There is no way you could not be worried about you, Darvish, after his seven-walk outing on Saturday at Texas. But, I mean, the Marlins guys, the Brewers guys, the Padres guys, Yonni Torino. You know what, let's get right into it.

Scott, if there was one pitcher from over the weekend that is available in a number of leagues that you think fantasy owners need to pick up, who is that pitcher? Well, the ones who were still available in mine, and I don't have all the ownership percentages down, but the two Marlins, I was able to grab Trent Richards in one league still. I was able to grab Pablo Lopez in one league still. Pablo Lopez pitched on Saturday, seven strikeouts of five and a third inning. In terms of ERA, he was the most impressive Marlins pitcher this spring, but then he missed a surprising number of bats in this first start. And he had actually made an improvement. since spring in terms of change of velocity. It was down and it seemed to be a more effective pitch as a result. He wasn't overthrowing that pitch. There was more of a difference between it and his fastball and obviously it led to a lot of miss bats. Yeah, 19 swinging strikes for Pablo Lopez. As Scott mentioned, three and runs in five and a third. The ownership percentages I'm giving out today are as of Sunday night. He was 35 percent owned, so widely available. I think some

tough calls for a lot of fantasy managers and who do I drop? You know, there's a lot of pitchers that we want, but who do we drop? And, you know, that's always a tough call. Plus, one thing that really jumped out to me, Heath, and I wanted to get know which pitchers that you really want to pick up, I mean, I think you take the Detroit Toronto series is the best example. There's just a lot of really bad lineups. And pitchers that face these bad lineups did very well. I don't think any of us are buying into Matt Shoemaker, just to guess. I don't know that any of us are buying into Jake Oterese, 11 strikeouts for O'Dorese against Cleveland on Saturday. So how about this?

Odarezi and Jose Barrios are the first pitchers to start a season for the same team with double-digit strikeouts since Randy Johnson and Kurt Schilling. So go Cleveland there against the twins. All right, but Heath, tell me the pitchers that you really want. Well, I think it's funny. Scott mentioned two Marlins pitchers and didn't even mention the best Marlins pitcher of the weekend because we weren't quite as excited about him beforehand, but Sandy Alcantara eight shutout innings against the Rockies and did not walk anyone, which is just astounding for him.

He didn't have many strikeouts, but he had plenty of swinging strikes. So I was encouraged by him. The two I'd be most excited to add would actually be on the same team again, except they'd be Brewers. It's Brandon Woodruff and Corbyn Burns, both of which have that RP eligibility, and showed promising signs. They're going to have some concerns with home runs in Milwaukee. Burns did against St. Louis, but I'm excited about both of those young pictures.

All right. I watch a lot of baseball. Too much baseball over the weekend. Corbyn Burns was actually the guy that stood out to me the most because he struck out 12 in five innings, but he did seem to lose his stuff, and it was evident in what happened as he got deeper into the game. And I guess that's not a huge surprise. Corbyn Burns was making his first major league start, and, yeah.

You know, it's third time through the order and then losing a little bit of velocity, and it's the first start of the season, so that does happen to a lot of pitchers, like Tyler Skaggs, for example, said it seemed to be a little out of gas because he had sort of an abridged spring training. But, yeah, Burns, it's like all the good things, because he had a great year out of the bullpen last year, but also the concern that I had, which is can he go deep into games, never having done it at this level?

Was this a good start? A great start? What kind of start was this for Corbyn Burns? Five innings, four runs, three homers, 12 strikeouts. And encouraging story. I mean, it was positive. Like, that was my main takeaway. Yeah, only two pitches.

He flashed in this start, and they started to hit him a little the second time through the order. But he was so dominant, even in terms of busy bats, once they started hitting him. And this is the thing that really stands out for me for Corbyn Burns. two pitches, yes, but the spin rate on his fastball set a record for spin rate in a game by 300, 300 RPM. The record previously was, I think, 2,600, and it was like 2,900. So 300 is how much he exceeded the previous high. That is huge, and obviously speaks to how effective that pitch is for him. Yeah, I mean, there's no way I'd leave him available if he was still available.

I see he's 60% owned, so he is available in a good number of leagues. Wasn't available in any of mine. And then I'll just say, because there was some Matt Shoemaker's Shade earlier. Yeah, yeah, go ahead. We picked him up in the For the People League, and he is someone in a deeper league that I'm interested in, just because he's shown us in the past when things are going right, he can be a very serviceable fantasy starting pitcher. And this was an encouraging first start.

The guy I picked up a lot. Yeah, I picked him up in the 12th team podcast league, the points league. So I'm not totally, I mean, on the spectrum of exciting pitchers from this weekend, he ranks pretty low. But, you know, we play with some people who are with it and are already targeted, had some of these sleepers already stashed away, some of these marlins and brewers. Right, right. Right. Yeah, there weren't that many guys for me to pick up. So I ended up getting Lucas Gialito.

And we also should need to talk about who were dropping. And the thing is with Gialito is that he. he could easily be terrible next time out. And I know that. And Gialito is about 17%-0, and he struck out eight royals on Sunday. What we're going to do is I'm going to give you a name, and I want like a one-to-two-sentence reaction, and how excited you'd be to pick them up if they were available.

So I have a lot of pitchers here and a lot more coming later in the show, but I think this is the big theme of the weekend. If you're going to be picking up somebody right now, it's probably a pitcher and not a hitter. Let's start with Trevor Williams and go all the way on down to Trent Thornton, who made his major league debut, debut for the Blue Jays and struck out eight tigers in five scoreless innings. In fact, Thornton more on him later, but he became the second pitcher in baseball history

to allow zero runs, zero walks, two or fewer hits, and eight or more strikeouts in his major league debut. And the first was Nick Kingham last year. All right, let's start with Trevor Williams. Scott, then Heath, give me like one to two sentences. He is 73% owned Trevor Williams for the pirates who actually had a 311 ERA last year and got off to a great start this year. Yeah, last year seemed kind of fluky.

He did top swinging strike total in this start. Only once last year did he top it, but it's still mostly a fastball. I'm not that interested. He is a guy that my interest in him throughout the season will largely depend on whoever he's facing next. I don't think there's a ton of upside here. I don't think he's going to turn into a must-start pitcher, but if he has good matchups, I'll use him. All right, then I think what we should do as we go down the list, kind of prioritize for us, tell the listeners who you want over who.

The next two guys are the Brewers guys, Brandon Woodruff and Corbyn Burns, 64% owned Woodruff, 60% owned Corbin Burns. These are the top two guys on my list, and I'm going to start them as relievers most weeks if I don't have a couple of good closures. Yeah, they're must-owned. Woodruff got 13 swinging strikes, and this one peaked at 97 with his basketball. Full Arsenal workhorse type. Could be really good. You guys like Woodruff better than Burns? I do. Yeah, I think so.

I think I have Burns one spot higher at the beginning of the year. I don't think anything's changed, so I think I'll just keep them there. Okay, and then, you know, let's, Heath, are they the top two on your list if you're just playing in a Roto League and you're not starting them as RPs? Probably. Okay. They're actually, I'm finding they're actually easier to start in a Roto League since they're just P spots. There are so many sparps that don't have SP eligibility yet. It's hard to fit them all in a relief pitcher spot.

That's good point. All right, Trevor Richards is next. He's 54% owned. And I really don't think he threw this new curve ball so much. So I was watching that start as well. And the Marlins' announcers were like, hey, he's not throwing the curveball, but he still had a good start. Six innings, one run, four strikeouts against Colorado. Trevor Richards, Heath.

I was excited. I thought he was worth a late round pick before this start. Nothing really changed for me because of the start. I'm a little questioning the Rockies right now and if they're going to be bad again outside, of course, offensively. But this was encouraging. Scott on Trevor Richards? He threw, well, they classified it as a slider, but he threw the breaking ball 23 times on 81 pitches. So he definitely was throwing it.

But he throws a slider. He added a curve ball, and I don't think he threw the curveball that much. I just remembered him being mostly a fastball change of guy. You're right. So he threw the slider more, I think. Or maybe it was a combination of the two, and it was classified as a slider, which is kind of what Chris was saying. But actually, I saw the whole feature on him, and he used the Rapsoto machine to increase the spin rate on his curveball. And basically, guys, I came up with a great team name.

Hap Soto Machine. Hap Soto Machine. Okay. Trevor, Rehn. I'm not sure. I get it. Rapsoto machine. I'm glad you're pleased.

The Rapsoto machine is what all these pitchers are using now to improve their pitching. And there's J.Hap, Juan Soto, Hap Soto machine. Okay. I guess I just don't know enough. Thanks. I don't know what I don't know. Heath, you know what you get it and you won't laugh. I know what the machine is.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Trevor Richards is behind the Brewers guys. How about Matt Boyd and Pablo Lopez? Who do you like better? They're both about 35% owned.

I'll take Pablo Lopez just because we've not had to deal with this from him before, and this was such a Matt Boyd. Like in the beginning, it wasn't because he was actually getting a lot more swinging strikes. He dominated the first three innings of this game. And then here comes Matt Boyd again. Well, he ends up with three runs and five innings, four total runs, and 10 strikeouts to one walk. It's hard to know what to make of any of the.

the Tigers or Blue Jays pitchers. Yeah. You know, other than the fact Boyd got 19 swinging strikes in this start the most, only once last year did he top 15. But there wasn't really any other indicators there that it was anything more than a matchup situation. But I know some people, some people I really like, really like Boyd, and I haven't figured out why yet.

So he's definitely somebody to keep an eye on. I'm just not moving to pick him up based on this. Matt, boy, didn't have a terrible year last year, 439 ERA, 1.16 whip, and he had a 263 ERA at home. So I'm sure we prefer Pablo Lopez over him. How about Jake Oteresey and Lucas Gialito and Sandy Alcantara? I'm not sure how to pronounce it, by the way, but these three are widely available, less than 30% owned. Odarezi, Gialito, Alcantara. Who's your favorite there?

Gialito, for me, the only one I'm completely disinterested in is Oterese, who, who was facing that Indians lineup, did get a ton of swinging strikes, all but one of them were on his fastball. So that right way is something I distrust. Gialito, though, he was really impressive yesterday. He has tweaked his mechanics, shortened his arm action, picked up like a mile per hour on his fastball from last year, but really it was the secondary stuff that he was overwhelming with,

particularly the change-up. And, I mean, this kind of talent, sometimes it takes a while to manifest in the big leagues. Yes. But this may be the start of it. I was picking him up in some deeper leagues. Obviously, he was lower on this pecking order. Right. But I did get him in a couple leagues.

Yeah, I'll go with Alcantara, Alcantara. Sandy. Sandy's my boy. Sandy, yeah. And I will agree with what Scott said about Oterese. I feel almost entirely like that about Gialito as well, but I do recognize we haven't seen him fail quite as much. Matt Shoemaker and Yanni Chorinos are both widely available.

Shoemaker, 14% owned, seven scoreless, two-walk, seven strikeouts against the Tigers, and Yanni Chorino, seven innings, one run, six strikeouts against Astros, who had, I believe, the fewest strikeouts in baseball last year. So how do Shoemaker and Churino stack up with Akon, Gialito, Pablo Lopez, etc. I was prioritizing Gialito. Well, you know what? That's not even true. I was prioritizing Shoemaker over Gialito because I feel like if he's healthy,

the downside for Shoemaker really isn't that low. I think he could be an innings eater on a start-by-start basis with pretty good strikeout numbers because of the splitter being so good. I didn't make a move for Torinos, but it was interesting, A, that they didn't use an opener with him this time. Like, the raise with what they did with their pitching staff, now suddenly other teams are interested in the opener, but maybe they're not as interested as much.

I don't know. But he actually started, and he showed a really good splitter. I just feel like I need to see more from Trinos, especially given all the other priorities out there right now. Yeah, I already had Yonni on a team, and if you told me that he was going to get to start every game, then I would be far more interested in him. He was actually pretty good.

year. His 3.5 E.1 ERA was exactly the same as his FIP. He doesn't get a ton of strikeouts, but he does get enough ground balls and has very good control. They will be using an opener Ryan Stannock tonight against the Rockies, but they needed it. They had a taxed bullpen, and they needed Yanni Chorinos, and he did a great job yesterday. Do you guys have any interest in Nick Margavichus of the Padres, five innings one run, five strikeouts against San Francisco or Trent Thornton,

five scoreless with eight strikeouts against Detroit for the Blue Jays. I mean, Margavichus was in A ball last year. Yeah. And the numbers weren't overwhelming for that level. They were fine. I mean, he wouldn't be getting this opportunity if they weren't fine. But no, I'm not particularly interested.

Trent Thornton, same thing. The numbers were only fine in the minors. he doesn't really have a great arsenal beyond the fastball. I take that as definitely a match-up success against the Tigers. I'm not looking into these too much at all. Okay. All right, there we go. I'm still just stunned.

That's actually the way you pronounce his last name. That's how I heard it on the broadcast. Mark Gavich is, I watched a lot of Padres games, man. Like, again, you don't know what to make of it, but Chris Paddock was really good, really good yesterday. Giants are such a great matchup and I this feels to me guys

like a season where streaming pitchers against matchups is going to be something that I do it could be an overreaction but just thinking about it that I do more than I've ever done before

especially in the American League I mean there are so many bad teams now so many easy matchups and I'm really excited for Jose Burrios because holy cow the AAL Central is so bad and I just with all the tanking going on right now.

I just feel like we're going to be shuffling pitchers in and out of our lineups depending on matchups. Is anybody else feeling that right now? It seems like a possibility. I don't want to overreact because, I mean, there will be days where all of these teams look good on office. There will be a whole series where they look good. But it does seem like the bad teams were more obvious than the good teams.

Just in terms of when we were making our picks, the order of finish in the divisions, every division but one we all picked the same team to finish last. So that's pretty telling in and of itself. All right, a lot to unpack from the weekend, guys. Let's take a look at the most added list. I do want to tell you all real quick, though. How's your bracket doing? Anybody have my champions out, UNC?

Perfect. Perfect bracket? My champion's still in, but I wouldn't say it's a good bracket. Who's your champion? Virginia. There you go. You got the one seed right. How about you, Heath?

I had Virginia. Oh, very good. Very good. Okay, well, we're getting closer and closer to one shining moment. You got to catch all of the NCAA NCAA tournament action. Well, the recaps, the highlights, the analysis, all of that on CBS Sports HQ, our 24-hour Sports Network. It's built for fans like you and me.

It's built for the diehard fans. We had a fantasy baseball show on CBS Sports HQ last week. You will get some fantasy baseball content on. there. So check it out. Just download the CBS Sports app. It's all free. And you can watch HQ on your fire TV, on your Roku, on your Apple TV, any streaming device on CBSports.com. You can see it. CBS Sportshq.com. So yeah, check it out. It's all free and it's outstanding. The most added list. All right. Enrique Hernandez is number one. He is up from 16% to 69%. And Tim Beckham is number number two, if there's anything you'd like to say.

And Jack Peterson, Jack Peterson is number three. These guys were all owned in less than 30% of leagues, and now they are 70% owned right around there. Heath and Rike Hernandez, Tim Beckham, Jack Peterson, are three most added hitters. Yeah, Hernandez is the only one of those three

that I actually added on any of my teams. I'm not really buying in to Beckham, and I still don't think that Peterson, I only got one league where it's a daily lineup league. and I don't think he's going to be valuable enough in leagues where you set your lineup weekly. So I did pick up Enrique Hernandez in a couple leagues, and I think that there's reason for excitement. Oh, my gosh. Are you guys, this is not.

Are you seeing this Freddie Freeman news? Ah! Freddie Freeman. No. He got hit last night? I don't even remember that. Eight to 12 weeks with a broken hand. Oh, my gosh.

Well, there goes my podcast league team. Wow. Replacements. Are you seeing this news, by the way? No. Okay, go to www. Aprilfools.com. Got them.

I hate you. Freddie Freeman's fine, everybody. I mean, that was pretty mean. They're already the worst team in baseball, and now you want to take away their best player. I do it every year. I had to get it in. Sorry, listeners.

Okay, also on the most added list. Eric Lauer is 68%. Remember him? He pitched on Thursday. So, Scott, now he got all these exciting guys on the Marlins, on the Brewers, and Eric Lauer's there. You know, where do you put Eric Lauer?

Pretty low. He wasn't somebody I'm excited about any way. He doesn't really have a standout pitch. I don't think has a lot of strikeout potential. Yeah, he's pretty low for me. This ad-drop list seems like mostly overreactions. I agree with Heath that Enrique Hernandez should be. Probably owned like he is now, 69% owned.

But the rest are not guys I've been making a move for. Like Colton Wong? No. Yep. I mean, you've got to go a little further down before you... Well, he said no. Scott's interested in. Start popping up.

Yeah, he said no, Scott said, yeah, but I think they meant the same thing. Like, no, we don't want him. And yes, it's an overreaction. But Domingo Santana, no. My yeah, I was agreeing with the no. Domingo Santana is not an overreaction. He's 88% of it, and he deserves it. He's off to a really good start.

Austin Barnes, getting a lot of questions. Should I drop my underachieving or not playing that much catcher, like a Williams-Austadio or, oh, who's the guy that we keep getting asked about? Francisco Mejia is the guy we get getting asked about. That's the guy. Should I drop Francisco Mejia for Austin? Boston Barnes. I wouldn't have a problem with either of those moves.

I, you know, it sounds weird to say after one series, but something wasn't right for Austin Barnes last year because this looks much more like the guy we thought we were getting then. He himself, there's a good chance he doesn't play much more than 50% of the time. That's just kind of the modern approach at catcher. So I'm not totally sure I dropped Mejia for him. He has more upside. He has only started one of the first four games, but if he's just,

starts today, that's 40% of the starts he's getting all of a sudden. So it's hard to know exactly after one series, but how the playing time's going to shake out anywhere. But Barnes looks like a top 12 catcher this year,

even if I'm not quite ready to put him in my top 10. Did Garrett Hampson only start once over the weekend, too? Yes, maybe twice. I believe so. It was frustrating because I figured with Daniel Murphy breaking his finger, Hamson would be in.

And they put Mark Reynolds in it first. Yeah. Which is good and bad because... Yeah, go ahead. I feel like it's easy to overreact to playing time situations this time of year. I mean, it's one series. We're going to need a couple weeks

to know really what the playing time trends are, especially... I feel like this is something managers often do. They like to incorporate the whole roster early on for whatever reason. It's weird, right? You know, they were facing a lefty last year, which probably had something to do with Reynolds being in. I suspect that Daniel Murphy injury is really good news for Garrett Hampson, even if it hasn't shown up yet.

Yeah, I just, here's the one thing I want. I want it to be good news for Hampson because I did pick him up in the podcast league. I think Hampson, he was pretty widely owned in my leagues, but you have to get him, especially if he needs steals. I want Ryan McMahon to just make two more appearances at second base because Daniel Murphy injury came a little. bit too early. McMahon is not second base eligible yet. He's made three appearances, I think three appearances at, uh, maybe a little to. The man started all four games.

Yeah, but I think he was at first base for one of them. So I think he made three appearances at second base. So we need just two more for him to get that eligibility. Um, guys, oh, by the way, speaking of line. They weren't facing a lefty yesterday, by the way. I don't, I don't know why I said that. They were facing Alcantara. It was not a lefty.

But regardless, yeah, they're, they're incorporated. their whole rosters, and we need to see more. And Scott said, you know, you don't take too much away from lineups. Just two things that I did think were really interesting. Malick Smith appears to be the lead-off hitter, at least against Ritees. And D. Gordon does have three steals, but all batting ninth, except in the Japan games that Smith wasn't healthy. And, oh, I was going to see.

Oh, Brandon Lowe. That's who it was. Brandon Lowe has sat two of four games. And yes, it is early, but that was disappointing to see. does not look like they're going to allow him to play every day. He had a terrible. Struck out a lot when he did play. I actually, in the podcast league, which is a points league,

head-to-head, smaller lineups to fill. You know, so I wasn't dropping him in any of my roto lineup leagues, but I did drop Lau for Shoemaker. Lao is 33% own. He's 0 for 9 with 5 strikeouts. Do you guys see anyone else on the most added list that needs to be added? I mean, Ryan McMahon is still only 79% owned. He should be 100.

Yeah. Frankie Montas, I didn't mention. He and Jordan Zimmerman are 25 and 23% owned, respectively. Yeah. Montauz is interesting. Yeah, he added a pitch. I think it was a splitter, actually. It is a splitter, yeah.

And his basketball velocity is way up, too. Had an 059 ERA this spring, and then obviously this good start. He was behind, like even this, Shoemaker Gialito class of pickups yesterday for me. I wasn't looking at him in any smaller leagues, but in my larger leagues, I had some claims for him. Okay, let's take a quick break here on fantasy baseball today. When we come back, weekend standouts and relief pitchers to add. If you need some saves, there might be some options out there.

We're coming right back on fantasy baseball today. All right, in that bullpen. So, yeah, actually, a lot of developments. Matt Barnes got a save. That was good. Jordan Hicks blew a save. Ian Kennedy got a save Michael Givens, if you own him,

was not used in the ninth inning, but he was used against the best hitters and I think he's still their closer. They just got like 10% of their wins for the season this weekend, and he got zero saves. He almost got a save yesterday on Sunday, but just ran out of gas

because they used them in the eighth inning twice. Josh Hader had an immaculate inning. Nine pitches, all fastballs, all strikes, got a save. All right, so people are picking up Taylor Rogers, even though, well, Blake Parker messed up in a tie game in the ninth inning on Saturday.

And I picked up Steve Seishik because Pedro's strope, he was hurt during spring. I thought he was going to start the year on the DL. He didn't. He's had two appearances. They both have been bad. So I do wonder if Seishik gets the next. next opportunity.

Scott, why you kick off a little bit. I saw somebody pick up Carl Edwards, I guess, thinking the same thing. But Seashch did get chances that Edwards didn't last year. It is a bit of a guessing game.

Who is out there that you guys think is a candidate for some saves? Someone in Seattle. Oh, yeah, that too. Hunter Strickland's out like two months. Two to three months. Eight to 12 week timetable.

Yeah, I actually dropped them in a 15-team league that didn't have DL spots, which stinks. The guy I was adding for Seattle was Anthony Swarzak, but it's just a guess. They had Nick Rumbolo get a save. They had someone else get a save who doesn't look like clothes or material. Corey Guarren. Well, Corey Garron blew it. Corey Garron came in. See, that's the guy I picked up.

I thought it was going to be Corey Garan, and he got in leading 10-7 in the 9th yesterday, and he was bad. And Rumbleow got the save on Saturday. Who got the save on Sunday? Jason Bradford got the save bailing out. Corey Garron yesterday. But he's not. He doesn't show the strikeout potential of the closer. I don't think he would get that shot.

Swarzak's going to be back from the DL soon, but it's just a guess. And, you know, maybe that situation, the Orioles situation, the Royals situation. I'd avoid him if you can. I would go for Taylor Rogers over any of them, but even that's questionable, just how much of a claim he has to that role.

Yeah, and the Cardinal situation could be up in the air tune if this continues for Hicks, given that one a pass, obviously. But eventually Carlos Martinez is going to be back probably for the bullpen. Alex Reyes is in the bullpen. Andrew Miller, of course, in the bullpen. They do sound excited about Hicks.

Apparently, in addition to the slider, he's added a change-up that he got a couple strikeouts with in his front. first appearance, not this one yesterday where he struggled. But he's unproven, you know, and they have a lot of alternatives in that bullpen. Heath, what's it out to you in the bullpen? I'd just like to see Josh Hader stay the closer because he's probably the best closer in baseball if he does. You think he will?

Well, Jeremy Jeffers is still not healthy. And he, I don't think he'll stay the closer, but I think he's got a chance to get a lot more saves than he did last. year. He's already started off, obviously, with an advantage. But I think if it's just Jeffress and Hader and they don't sign Craig Gimbril, we're going to see Josh Hater get a lot more saves needed last year. I think Drew Steckin Rider is probably the closer. Sergio Romo got a save, but I don't think Steckin Rider was available when that happened.

It was good to see Jose Alvarado for the raise, you know, be used as a conventional closer. One inning on Friday, one inning on Saturday, got to save both days. then Diego Castillo got the save on Sunday. You've got to figure Alvarado they weren't going to throw them three days in a row. As I mentioned, Matt Barnes got to save. If there's one guy in Kansas City, Heath, would you rather have Kennedy or Peralta? No. I don't think there is one guy in Kansas City.

And like Medeos just said that. So I would expect Peralta is going to lead the team in saves right now, but I don't expect anybody to get 20 saves. and Scott are you concerned about David Robertson right now a little his velocity seemed pretty normal in the first outing the second outing it was kind of down I'm not sure I can make anything of that yet but obviously he didn't pitch well either time

and while I do think he's the favor for saves in Philadelphia we know that's going to be a timeshare to some degree so I I was um I dropped him for, or I tried to drop him for Alvarado in one league. I don't know if that claim went through for me. And I thought about it.

I didn't actually pull the trigger, but I thought about dropping Robertson for trying to remember who it was, but somebody like the Will Smith class of closer, somebody who's more clearly the closer, but in a very questionable situation for saves. I ended up sticking with Robertson over that, but it's, you know, I was toying with the idea. All right, that's your bullpen recap.

Quick news and notes, Justin Upton out 8 to 12 weeks with Turf Toe. Corrick and Abel is having Tommy John surgery this week. Daniel Murphy broke his finger. Could be a long-term thing. Hunter Strickland out two to three months with a lat strain. Francisco Lindor is going to see an ankle specialist today, and hopefully we have more news. But you never want to see a guy go to a specialist.

Miami first baseman Garrett Cooper is on I.L. with a calf injury and the Marlins recalled Peter O'Brien. Some rumors. San Diego talking to Dallas Keiko, according to Ken Rosenthal. The Mets Brewers in Tampa, Bay are interested in Craig Kimball, according to Ken Rosenthal. So, Keikel, maybe San Diego,

Mets, Brewers, the Mets, that's interesting. Gosh, Diaz would be their closer if they got Kimball. You would think, right? You would think. Man, that would be sad if Kimbril wasn't a closer.

I mean, it'd be sad if Diaz wasn't a closer, too. The Mets may use an opener, or the Yankees, rather, may use an opener today. So if you picked up Domingo or Mahn for two starts, I don't know what's going to happen. I think they, Louis Sasse pitched yesterday, but they may use Chad Green as an opener today.

I hope they don't. I got to mix things up. You lose a series to the Orioles. You got to change things up. You know how they started last year? They lost three or four to the Orioles. But I was still pretty pissed off. Kevin Gosman and A.J. Mentor could be back on April 4th.

Mike Fultenevich could be back on April 14th. Clayton Kirshaw tentatively set for a rehab start this week on Thursday. How about this? All four games of the Houston-Tampa-Bays series lasted two hours and 40 minutes or less. That's awesome. Tampa Bay second baseman Joey Wendell left with a hamstring injury. I don't know if that affects Brandon Lowe at all. No, maybe.

And it seems like Alex Wood likely will not be back by mid-April. And the Padres, okay, you got the president's race. in Washington, which is always fun. Did you see what the Padres introduced yesterday for a between-innings fun little race? Did not. It is the... The Anchorman race.

The Anchorman race. Thank you for reading the notes, Heath. Did you actually see it? I saw people tweeting about it. I did not actually see it. It was really funny. The gigantic Ron Burgundy, Brick, Brian Fantana,

Champkind, heads, racing. it's good stuff so who else stood out this weekend that you guys want to talk about Heath I'll kick it to you uh

Trey Turner he may just be the most valuable hitter in fantasy opening day he steals three bases and then on Sunday double dongs and he's striking out too much

but who cares right now the way he's hitting and the way he's running I'm very excited about Trey Turner and just like I wrote about it before with the

season started. And it's kind of like a rich man's version of the argument we've made for Adalberto Mondesie. But he's a guy who could steal 50, 60 bases, hit 20 home runs and hit close to 300. And none of those things would really be

all that surprising. Yeah. And let's not forget, Pete Alonzo had a great weekend, too. That was a fun series. But Trey Turner, all the guys in the Mets, all the guys in the nationals, they faced aces. Five to six aces, you know. All those pitchers were top 100 picks

and five of them were like top 60 picks. So anyone who hit well in that series, obviously, like Trey Turner hit a walkoff home runoff of Justin Wilson yesterday, but, you know, obviously they face some very good pitching. So great start for Trey Turner. And Scott, how about you, a standout? So this guy was widely drafted.

I kind of backed away from him because of struggles this spring. And I think there was some mention of his velocity being down, but first showing was great for Colin McHugh. Nine strikeouts in his five innings of work. Velocity was pretty normal. Back according to his days when he was starting, obviously not last year out of the bullpen, but for his time starting the velocity was pretty normal.

And his best pitch yesterday was the slider, which he didn't even have the last time he was starting for the Astros, picked it up from Brad Peacock. It's been a pitch that's made Brad Peackew. a worthwhile pitcher in the majors, and McHugh did great with it yesterday, or Saturday, I think it was. So stock up for McHugh. Yeah, and talk about the other guy in that game, because he faced Tyler Glass now, who also did well. I think he only had four strikeouts, but again, I believe the Astros struck out less than any other team of baseball last year, and they added Michael Brantley. But I sat Tyler Glass now, and it was foolish.

Well, I mean, it wasn't a great start in terms of overall result, but in terms of kind of alleviating my concerns, it was really good because he was another guy who I liked in theory and then kind of backed away from when he was struggling to throw strikes this spring in addition to kind of tweaking his delivery. It just seemed like the potential for him to sabotage himself there. but 66% of his pitches were strikes in this one, and he only walked one batter. So, yeah, Glass Now seems like he was still a worthy investment for those who invested in him. And then one other name I'll say, and Chris wrote about him in the Waver Wire column,

but Yandi Diaz has started all four games for the race. He has always been a guy that hits the ball really hard, makes good contact, just hits the ball on the ground way, way, way too much. Tampa Bay is generally pretty good at first. fixing that very, very early on, and I wouldn't make anything that's yet, but his ground ball rate is below 50%, it's below 45%, his fly ball rate is up at 35%. If he can come anywhere close to maintaining that and plays every day, he's going to be very good. Yanni Diaz is 12% own. That's a really good call. 333 batting average, one homer off, he smoked a laser

off Garrett Cole, one walk, one strikeout, two doubles in four games. Another guy who faced elite pitching over the weekend and came out of it looking really good. Yandi Diaz. My weekend standout is a bad one. You gotta be kidding me. You Darvish was terrible. Oh my gosh, it was so bad. I think the first 10 hitters he faced either struck out or walked.

But he ended up giving up three earned runs on two hits and two and two thirds with seven walks and four strikeouts. Wow. Now last year Carlos Martinez, I think it was his first start. He walked like six guys. and he was able to sort of recover from that. But the year he had last year, didn't have a great spring. This was a very troubling start for you, Darvish. How are you guys feeling about him?

I mean, obviously you didn't invest in him like a must-start pitcher 12th round. If there weren't any concerns about him, he wouldn't have gone that late. So obviously I hoped for better. I probably did start him this first week, but I'm not sure what to take away from this, you know, it being just one start,

and obviously a lot of really good pitchers struggled in their first start. Darvish is the one I'd probably be most likely to bench of that group the second time through. I think he's facing the Brewers, so that makes it easier. But beyond that, I'm more likely to bench him

next time out. I'm not sure what to take away from this. It's just too little information. Yeah, it was bad. They said the stuff was good. He just couldn't locate it. I was conflicted all spring because I didn't like Darvish quite as much as you guys did, but I seemed to like him more than the consensus.

And I would assume there's going to be an overreaction to this. I'm not going to start him until I see him get through a start now with some control. But other than that, I'm not worried long term. Okay, and it should be mentioned, I don't think his control was bad before last year. After Tommy John, his control got better, and then I think last year, He definitely struggle with it. But okay, so more from over the weekend. Christian Eilich has four home runs and four games.

Cody Ballinger has four home runs and four games. They're off to outstanding starts. Paul Goldschmidt has four home runs. He homer three times on Friday. Let's see what else. How about Mikel Franco? You guys interested in him? He's off to a good start.

I haven't made a move to pick him up, but there's more upside there than he's shown in the past. Yeah, I've always liked him. It's just the margin for error is pretty slim as a number eight hitter, even in a good lineup. And I don't see much of a path to get him too high in the order. So he's going to have to be a deeper league guy. It's funny that you mentioned him being an eight hitter. Cesar Hernandez batting seven, Michael Franco batting eighth.

There was a moment in one of the games this weekend where Cesar Hernandez stole second base with Franco up. What do they do? They walk Franco to get to the pitcher. Michael Franco wasn't very happy about it. So that just leads me to believe that if Cesar Rennandez, Hernandez is batting seventh. He might not be stealing very many bases because it would make Michael Franco very mad. And it makes sense.

You don't want to do that. You don't want to leave first base open with the pitcher on deck. Well, it depends on how many else there are. It does depend on how many out there are, yeah. Jay Bruce, I think, is underowned. He homered Saturday and Sunday. He's 26% owned. And where is he eligible?

I know in Yahoo Leagues he's first and outfield eligible. What about in CBS Leaves? Jay Bruce's first base eligible? Yep. Yep, dual eligible. Yeah, so I just want to throw his name out there. How do you feel about Austin Meadows, 64% owned? Right now he has two home runs and one steal,

one walk seven strikeouts for Austin Meadows. Yeah, struck out a lot early on, so I don't know whether to take the home runs as a good sign or the strikeouts is a bad sign. Ultimately, my opinion, hasn't changed that much yet. Definitely see the potential for Meadows, but treating him as kind of like a number four outfielder right now, not necessarily worth rostering yet in three outfielder leagues.

Yeah, I mean, if you were the guy that lost Justin Upton and you had to pick up an outfielder, then he'd have been on the relatively short list of guys I was looking to replace him. Would you go with Jay Bruce or Austin Meadows? I'd probably go with Bruce. Okay. Let's talk about pitchers for the rest of the show. I'm going to give you some names. You tell me if there's any reason to own these players.

We're looking for guys to drop. There are so many pitchers to add. So can we own, should we own any of these guys? Sunny Gray. Yeah, it's still own gray. Awful. Awful, yeah, sure. Luke Weaver.

I'm holding on to him. I would... The best pitcher I dropped this weekend for one of those exciting options was Tyler Skaggs. Who isn't even on this list. What? You did what? You dropped Skaggs? It was a fairly shallow league.

I'm not positive. Tyler Skaggs is going to get picked up based on me dropping him. And I guess in that context, I would be willing to drop any of these pitchers, Sonny Gray included. But looking at the old list, whole list,

Sunny Gray is the only one that I would be reluctant to drop. So that includes Luke Weaver. I'd be fine dropping him for somebody who made a stronger impression the first time through and I'm at risk of losing because of it. The only, the other players on the list,

Sunny Gray, Luke Weaver, Kyle Wright, Renaldo Lopez, and Dylan Bundy. And I did drop Sunny Gray for Lucas Gialito, I believe. He just, he's a myth. Sunny Gray is, Sunny has nothing. What? He has nothing.

I have to completely, I've changed my tune completely. That's where we're kind of different, too. And I don't think the odds of Lucas Gialito being better than Sunny Gray for the rest of the year are very good. Yeah, I agree. I know that he is definitely more likely to get picked up right now, and you might be able to drop Sunny Gray and then win the Fab Battle for him after his next good start. He is a bit of a myth, and I think he's kind of just a guy, but I expect he's going to be better than Gialito.

He probably will, but Gialito to me definitely has more upside. There's this myth that Sunny Gray has good stuff. Where is his good stuff? He doesn't throw hard? Like he doesn't miss bats He stinks Enough of setting He's a really good ground ball pitcher at him

Weren't you the sunny He was like 72 hours ago I was I was the sunny gray guy I was but that's like a late round flyer Not as like oh I gotta get sunny gray on all my teams But gosh what I saw yesterday was what I saw In two years with the Yankees He's not good

So Well He was he was With the Yankees He was forced to feature a pitch That wasn't very good talked about that since leaving his slider. He looked a lot better in spring training.

Obviously, this is a discouraging first start, but the upside is only so high for Sunny Gray. So in a shallow league context, if you want to go after somebody with a little more sizzle, I don't know that I'd draw that line at Gialito. The guy I dropped Skaggs for was Trevor Richards, who

I like more than Gialito. But, I mean, just the general idea of dropping Sunny Gray for somebody who looks exciting. You'd only consider doing it in the shallow league, and I think it's appropriate in a shallow league. I might be back on the Sunny Grey Bandwagon at some point, but right now I am very anti-Sunny Gray. So just take it out of it.

No, if I have to make a stance, it's this. I don't think he's that good. I just, I don't know why I bought into that he could be better outside the Yankees. I know his road ERA was great with the Yankees, but he's not like he's in a good ballpark. Now he's in a terrible ballpark in a tough division again. All right, so let's talk about some of the... Yeah. Let's talk about some of the studs who were duds over the weekend.

Carlos Carrasco, Walker Bueller, yikes. Two swinging strikes, no strikeouts in three innings, five runs for Bueller, and Juller. Carasco, Bueller, and Flaherty were all really bad. Heath, anything concerned you there with those three? I'm not going to hold Flaherty start against him. We already talked about my rule with Miller Park, or really beer parks in general.

If you're bad at a beer park, it doesn't count. Walker Bueller does kind of bring up the concern for him at the beginning of the year was that they took it so easy on him in the spring that he might get off to a slow start and we're also worried about his innings so the end of the season might be rough. This was not a good start for Walker Bueller. I still think he'll be a very good pitcher,

but it may be a couple starts away. What about Bush Stadium? That's kind of an exception, right? Yeah, that is an exception. So, yeah, it was the whole Red Sox staff, I guess because they had a deep playoff run last year. But all four of the guys who went out there were terrible. And Walker Bueller's, another example, Blake Snell is another example, guys who hardly pitched this spring because teams wanted to save those bullets for games that matter, which is a good idea in theory. but, you know, maybe it's just a coincidence,

but it's kind of looking like spring training. There's a level of importance to it for pitchers because, yeah, I think that explains a lot of the just horrible starts we're seeing from great pitchers early on. They just weren't quite ready yet. What about this group? Studs being Duds Part 2. Nick Povetta, Jake Arietta. Now, he gave up one run, but he walks six, so I guess it's a little harsh.

A. A. M. A. It is a little harsh. But Pivotta was bad. J. Hap was bad against the Orioles. Robbie Ray was nine strike.

Robbie Ray. He was very Robbie Ray. Zach Godley was terrible at the Dodgers. Look, the Dodgers ambushed the Diamondbacks this week. Cole Hamels, knew who shouldn't start them at Texas. Five runs in five innings at Texas. And Freddie Peralta, 80%-0. One of them, still one of the most added players.

Peralta, had a bad start against St. Louis. So I'll take Arieta off the list. Actually, no, I won't, because the question is, are any of these guys dropable, in your opinion? Pivotta, Areietta, Hap, Ray, Godley, Hamils, Peralta. Peralta. The big concern for Peralta now is it's not going to be too long until Jimmy Nelson's ready,

and one of those three is not going to be in the starting rotation. I would say Peralta is in last place now. He needs an arsenal. He's just so fastball dependent. I think Povetta and Hap are the only, well, Povetta, Hap, and Ray are the only ones I wouldn't consider dropping from this group. Arieta, Godley. I want to drop Hamps either.

So, okay, so basically Arieta, Godly, and Freddie Peralta, they either don't, I don't feel like they have the upside that you'll really missed them or they haven't shown enough that you should give them preferential treatment over the more interesting options emerging on waiver while right now. I was always surprised. I mean, I think Peralta does have interesting upside because it's a really good fastball and he's shown a lot of strikeout potential with him. But I was always surprised he was owned in more leagues than Corbyn Burns and Brandon Woodruff.

That would have been a change I made even before this first run through the, rotation. What about Pablo Lopez? What about Matt Shoemaker? Are those guys better than Peralta? Are they better than Arellida? I would drop Peralta for both of them. I would probably drop Arieta and Godly for Pablo Lopez specifically. I don't know about Shoemaker. Yeah, I would drop Peralta for both of them and I wouldn't drop the other two for either of them. What about the Red Sox guys? Eduardo Rodriguez, Rick Porcelo, Nate Evaldi, all owned in 93 to 96% of leagues and Rodriguez, Porcelo Evaldi, are they dropable? Yeah.

No. Is that all you need? Yeah, that's perfect. Great. Let's see who else. You wouldn't be willing to drop all three of them, Heath? Is that what she said? I wouldn't drop Rick Porcelo in a points league.

He's probably got a lot of quality starts coming. I was not, and I think there's upside for Rodriguez, so you could put him in that same category. I was not ever convinced that Nate Avaldi was worth drafting. Yeah, I think one more bad start from him, and we're going to see that ownership get probably below 80%. But he's 95% owned right now. I think we've got to keep an eye on Stephen Strasbourg's velocity. He was averaging, I didn't look online,

but when I watched the game, it looked like 93-ish, 94. And it looks like kind of the lowest of his career. I mean, his first start of 2018, Strassberg was averaging 95.6 miles per hour. So he certainly didn't have a bad start. Six innings, four runs, two walks, eight strikeouts against the Mets. But it is something to look at here because it was way down. Down a couple miles per hour from last year's average.

But it was similar to what he was throwing last September. Yeah. But that was after he came back from an injury, right? Yeah, I agree. It's something to keep an eye on. but it could turn around over the rest of the month. Sure. Okay, some other interesting pitchers.

Fringy starting pitchers, part one. These guys are owned in 65 to 79% of leagues. The one guy who pitched who had a great line that I saw that looked the worst, like that I didn't buy was Michael Waka. Michael Waka, six innings, four hits, one run, four walk, seven strikeouts. Fairly low swinging strike rate. But it was the Brewers, and I do feel like, They are just going to be brutal at home against Ritey's.

White Waka, Michael Paneda, four-scoreless innings of five strikeouts against the Indians, and Tyler Skaggs was disappointing. Two runs in four-and-two-thirds. May have been a little fatigued, according to the article I read. But how would you rank those three? Michael Waka, Michael Panada and Tyler Skaggs. Panada Skaggs, Waka. I'm actually going with Paneda last because it was strange what the twins decided to do with them.

He was awesome for four innings, efficient for four innings. They pulled him after four innings to go with Martine Perez. And it seems like there may be some legs to that strategy. The problem for Paneda has always been he basically just has two pitches, really good fastball, really good slider. He's tried to incorporate a changeup. It's never gone well for him. So the twins may be trying to apply kind of a new approach.

to him that we've seen other teams fly with other pitchers and that's not letting him face the lineup a third time because the arsenal isn't diverse enough to survive that that that kind of seemed like the plan there was always the thought going into this start that martin Perez was going to relieve him pretty early kind of a piggyback effort if that becomes the norm for him it's going to be hard for him to factor outside of outside of like category leagues where he's essentially a glorified long reliever so I It was also his first start back. He didn't pitch last year. So that could be it. I've not read anything suggesting that's what it is. There was a lot of vague talk on Twitter that that was the idea. I couldn't find anything concrete either. Right.

It could also just be that they wanted to really ease him back from Tomah gun surgery. Because he's going to be on some sort of innings limit this year, I would assume. I can't believe you have him over Skaggs. Some of that. I was never quite as excited about Tyler Skaggs as you. I don't think he's bad. I just, there's a lot of questions there as well. No, there's no questions.

Come on. I can't tire skagg. All right, more pitchers. Derek Rodriguez, Matt Harvey, Jake Junis, Wade Miley, Aaron Sanchez, Dakota Hudson. You want any of them? Derek Rodriguez. I did actually pick up Derek Rodriguez.

I think I'm going to start him this week. He's at home against the raise. Matt Harvey, Jake Junet. I'm actually going to start Derek Rodriguez at home against the race over U. Darvish. Wow. Other guys, Harvey, Junis, Wade Miley, Aaron Sanchez, Dakota Hudson.

I have a lot of Wade Miley shares, just in the hopes the Astros figure something out there, just because they have such a good track record with salvaging scrapheed pitchers. And, I mean, this first start against the race, It wasn't anything that would discourage me from that. Wasn't anything that would make me rush out and pick them up if I didn't already have him. But I'm not really looking to drop them.

Heath, we got to go. We have like 30 seconds left. So I'm going to give you the Deep League guys and tell me if you want any of these dudes. Bryce Wilson, terrible for the Braves at Philadelphia. Marco Estrada, Jeff Samarja, Frankie Montas, Mike Leak, Derek Holland, Matt Moore, Brett Anderson. Yeah, right now, Montas is the most interesting of this group to me, just with the new pitch and the good velocity and the big park. I would like, like, I've got some interest in Bryce Wilson in the long-term future,

but I still have no idea why he's making starts in the major leagues and Gohara down in the minors. Tomorrow on the show, I will probably take a look at some guys who are off to really slow starts and ask the guys if they are concerned about them, and then the guys will say, No, it's only been four or five games. So get excited for that. I'm Adam Azer with Scott White and Heathcoming. This has been fantasy baseball today.

Sorry about the April Fool's joke. We'll talk you on Tuesday.